The Painting Conservation Studio at the Princes Czartoryski Museum

The Painting Conservation Studio at the Princes Czartoryski Museum provides care over the National Museum’s collection of paintings and the Princes Czartoryski Collection. It was established in 1985, through years of effort on the part of Dr Marek Rostworowski, head of the branch. The set-up and management of the studio was assigned to Krystyna Bartel-Bochnak, an experienced conservator with the National Museum in Krakow.

One of the studio’s earliest achievements was the preparation of objects for the exhibition ‘Polish Jews’ held at the National Museum in Krakow in 1989–1990. Important assignments also included care of numerous paintings and decorative art items, varied in terms of technique used and state of preservation, exhibited in the Klasztorek (‘Little Monastery’) House until 2011, and ancient art objects at the Arsenal, as well as the preparation of these items for display.

The studio exercises conservation supervision over the conditions of storage and the state of preservation of the greatest masterpieces in the museum’s collections: Lady with an Ermine by Leonardo da Vinci, and also the Landscape with the Good Samaritan by Rembrandt. It is also responsible for courier tasks during loans, involving care and guardianship over loaned exhibits.


The most significant international exhibitions for which Lady with an Ermine has been loaned (and conservation care provided) include:

• Circa 1492: Art in the Age of Exploration, National Museum of Art in Washington, DC, 1991–1992
• visit to the home country: display at the Pinacoteca di Brera in Milan, the Palazzo Pitti in Florence, and the Quirinal in Rome, 1998
• Faces of the Renaissance at the Bode Museum in Berlin, where the Lady co-starred with works by such masters as Donatello or Bellinii
• Leonardo da Vinci: Painter of the Milan Court, unprecedented and prestigious exhibition at the National Gallery in London, 2011–2012

The painting has also been loaned to foreign exhibitions of Polish art collections:

• Leonardo da Vinci Lady with an Ermine: Treasures from the Princes Czartoryski Museum, Japan 2001
• Leonardo da Vinci and the Splendor of Poland. A History of Collecting and Patronage, USA, 2003
• Poland. Treasures and Art Collections, Royal Palace in Madrid, 2011

The studio specializes in old paintings, and its staff use state-of-the-art equipment required in museum conservation work, to exercise due care in preserving the aesthetic properties of the historic art objects. The conservators also collaborate with specialists in various sciences, and thus continue to expand their knowledge of the techniques, technologies and history underlying the works of art. This enables them to develop the safest and most rational procedures for the treatment of every object entrusted to them.

A recent major project at the studio was the preparation of objects for the permanent exhibition of the new branch of the National Museum in Krakow, EUROPEUM, showing the most valuable European paintings from our museum’s collections, by such artists as Lorenzo Lotto, Vlaminck, Brueghel, Strozzi, Cranach, Bellini, or Dirck van Baburen.

Studio team

• Katarzyna Novljaković – Senior Conservator, Head of the Conservation Studio, knovljakovic@mnk.pl
• Małgorzata Chmielewska – Senior Conservator, mchmielewska@mnk.pl
• Dominika Tarsińska-Petruk – Senior Conservator, dpetruk@mnk.pl
• Katarzyna Brzozowska – Assistant, kbrzozowska@mnk.pl

Contact

Kraków, ul. Pijarska 6
tel. +48 12 370 54 60
knovljakovic@muzeum.krakow.pl